Post-colonialism and the future of Deaf culture: impressions from my YouTube playlist
By Ylva Söderfeldt The culture of sharing entertaining, brief videos on social media has in a short period of time introduced a number of genres never thought of before. The success of some, such as "unboxing" videos that let us share the experience of opening the package of desirable products, seem unexpected and bewildering at least to those of us who still remain in a 20th century mindset. The appeal of seeing cute animals, or people falling over, is perhaps more easily understandable, as they are connected to longer traditions in entertainment. Old or new, all of these genres however have an obvious common denominator: they are primarily meant to generate emotions. This is true also for the vast number of available videos and compilations showing the activation of cochlear implants (CI). Usually but not always featuring small children, these videos can easily be found by searching for "hearing for the first time". The conventions are remarkably strong for be